The Japanese automaker Toyota will bring a handful of their remarkable racing cars to the Goodwood Festival of Speed, July 3-5. The three day event is Europe’s answer to Monterey Historic Races that take place every year at Laguna Seca. The event allows racing enthusiasts to get an up close look at everything from classic competition cars to the racecars of tomorrow and allows these machines the opportunity to do what it is that they do best when they race against the clock and the hill.

The sombrero wearing import carmaker will be showing off a Lexus LF-A super car and a TF108, last year’s unrestricted F1 car complete with the German Timo Glock behind the controls. Making almost as much power as the F1 machine, Toyota will also bring a four wheel drive Celica GT4-X developed by English based tuners Fensport. The Celica makes 700 HP and can make consistent 10 second quarter mile passes all day long.

Rally enthusiasts will be happy to know that their will be a pair of classic Group B Celicas as well as the car that won them the Manufacturer’s Championship in 1999, a WRC Corolla. Alain Prost’s championship ice racing Toyota Auris will also be on hand, the car is built to look like the compact city car, except the racecar is built from carbon fiber and features a tuned 3.0 Liter V6. There will also be a couple of Can-Am and Le Mans racers on hand as well.

However, it will be Gazoo Racing’s V10-powered Lexus LF-A endurance racer, coming straight from competing in the Nurburgring 24, along with an IS-F that competed in the same race twice around the clock, that will be one of the main attractions on the hill climb course, making an appearance at the Earl of March’s annual gathering.

Press release after the jump.

Press release

Toyota has lined up five notable debuts for this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed, led by a first appearance in the UK for the Lexus LF-A supercar.

Gazoo Racing’s V10-powered LF-A will be one of the main new attractions on the hill climb course, coming to Goodwood after successfully completing the Nürburgring 24-hour race as part of its continuing development programme. It will be joined by another competition Lexus, the racing IS F which also took part in the 24-hour event.

Panasonic Toyota Racing will be back at Goodwood, ready to stir the crowds with a supreme display of F1 speed and technology. Timo Glock, one of grand prix racing’s fast-rising stars, will be on hand to drive the TF108, the last F1 Toyota to be designed before the sport introduced its current restrictions on wing sizes and additional aerodynamic elements.

The occasion will also provide a high profile showcase for Toyota’s continuing involvement in grass roots motor sport in the UK. The Toyota Sprint Series will be represented for the first time on the hill climb, in the shape of the mighty 700hp Fensport 4WD Celica GT4-X. Two more cars from the popular competition will also be included in the festival’s static display.

With the likely absence of any ice around Goodwood in early July, Alain Prost’s all-conquering Andros Trophy Auris will be confined to Toyota’s static display. The four-time F1 champion has claimed back-to-back titles in the annual ice racing championship at the wheel of this extraordinary car, which features carbon fibre bodywork and a tuned version of the 3.0-litre V6 engine that was used in the Lexus RX.

The festival rally stage will echo to the roar of some of Toyota’s most celebrated and successful machinery, including Group B Celica Twin-cam Turbo, Celica ST185, Celica GT4 ST205 and its ultimate championship machine, the WRC Corolla.

As well as enjoying the thrill of seeing the TF108 F1 car in action, visitors will also be able to get a driver’s eye view from the cockpit in the pit stop challenge simulator. This will form part of Toyota’s display stand alongside a wealth of classic and contemporary cars, including the mighty Toyota 7 Can-AM V8, the TS010 Le Mans Car and Yaco Racing’s 2008 German Procar Championship-winning Auris S2000.

The wilder side of Toyota styling can be enjoyed with Aygo Crazy and iQ Gazoo, and the Arctic-conquering Polar Hilux will also be on show. Toyota exhibits in the Technology Pavilion will include cut-away versions of new Prius and iQ, illustrating Toyota’s latest Hybrid Synergy Drive system and, on the iQ, its new Toyota Optimal Drive technologies. Another LF-A will be on show, along with Crystallised Wind, a glass artwork by the Japanese artist Sou Fujimoto, inspired by Lexus’s L-finesse design principles.